Alec's POV
I left the room before I could reveal any more of myself to this stranger who I didn't even care for in the first place. What was I thinking? What had I done? Even Jane didn't know about Elijah, but here I go telling Bella, who is currently the bane of my existence, things that no one else has ever known. She did not need to know that about me. I should not have given her any ammunition to be able to use against me, but it was almost impossible not to remember what happened those many years ago. Looking at her on the floor, her eyes closed despising what she was doing, but unable to control herself. It was like looking into a mirror.
"Take my blood and pretend." She said. Silly little girl has no idea what she has gotten herself into. Granted, she didn't have many choices. She was either going to die at the hands of one of us or at the hands of Bella. I would have chosen Bella myself if I were her. Her cool lips pressed up against my skin…what the hell? What is wrong with me? I shook myself of the vision and flew down the stairs, down to the main floor and even further down to the underground cellars.
One. Two. Three. Four…the fourth door was Ulric's chamber. I pounded on the wooden door three times and waited – no answer. I pounded harder, bits of wood splintering from the force of my impatience to get what I promised Bella done so that I could start avoiding her at all costs.
"Ulric, I am in need of your assistance. Please, if you could do me the favor. Open the door."
A grunt echoed from the other side of the door before it opened revealing Ulric. It never seized to amaze me that someone so small could have so much power.
"Were you trying to avoid me, old friend?" The little man who came up to my hips in height made a rude gesture.
"I've grown tired of your demands Alec. What is it that is so urgent that you need to wake me from my slumber?" I rolled my eyes. Warlocks could be so touchy.
"Be lucky that you can sleep, for that is the one thing I do miss above all others."
He continued to glare up at me. He definitely was not in the mood to chitchat.
"I need your help…I made a promise to someone and it requires compulsion." He stood quiet wanting me to elaborate.
"Have you heard of the newborn, Ulric?"
He nodded in response.
"Well, she would like for us to release the humans, only they've already seen too much and we need you to make them forget. So, come on." I started moving toward the stone steps when I realized he hadn't followed me.
"What are you waiting for? Let's go. NOW." I demanded, but he crossed his arms and leaned up against the wall.
"There is something different about you, dear friend. I have never once in my hundreds and hundreds of years of knowing you heard you promise anything to anybody…much less to a woman and even less to a newborn. What is so special about this one?"
I growled at him. How dare he think that I believe Bella to be any different than anyone else? Bella, selfish Bella who refuses to become one of us, who refuses to be Aro's mate, who refuses, even, to feed like us. She believes herself to be superior.
"Easy there, Alec. I merely meant to say that it is just a bit out of character for you. That is all. I will join you and clear their minds of the knowledge of your existence and of this place." Satisfied with his response I turned on my heels and walked back up to the room with the humans. I expected Bella to still be there, but she was not. When I realized that she had gone I found that it bothered me. Where could she have gone? I was supposed to be watching her. I would have to find her once the deed was done and let her know that she is not to wander this place without me.
I faced the crowd of victims then and regretted letting them go. I was getting hungry and I could really go for one or two of them…but I made a promise and I intended to keep it, if not for Bella, then for Elijah.
The girl who had risked her life to save Bella stood up and walked over to me. I could smell the blood through her fresh wound. There was no trace of venom – that was odd, she wouldn't turn. She stood very close to me. She obviously had a death wish. It was only by the grace of Bella that she was still alive. Yet, here she stands in front of a thousand year old vampire with no sign of fear on her pretty little face.
"You're in love with her." She said with a thick Italian accent. Was she out of her mind?
"You don't scare me anymore. Not now that I know what you are and I've seen what you have done for her. I know you could kill me if you wanted to, but I also know that you want to protect me…for her."
I snarled at her and grabbed her by the throat. "You will not talk to me this way. You are not my equal, you are my dinner." And I tossed her to the side.
"Does anyone else have anything to say?" When everyone had gone silent I nodded to Ulric to do what was asked of him. I then commanded him to lead them out and set them free.
"Yes sir." Was all he replied as I stormed out of the room to find Bella.
I went to her chamber, but before I could lift my hand to knock on the door it flew open and I was grabbed by the front of my cloak and pressed up against a wall.
"Why did you do it?" she breathed against my face and I could smell the blood still on her lips. I leaned forward to lick it off, it was so seductively sweet smelling, but my head was knocked backwards again and I focused my eyes on her. I wanted to strangle her, but I couldn't. Aro would see it through my thoughts and I'd be done for. I couldn't even numb her senses with my power; her power didn't allow me to.
"What's your agenda? What do you want from me? What is it that you're trying to do?" Being this close to her was proving to be more distracting than I was comfortable with. I raised my hand and loosened her grip on me before I spoke.
"I don't know why I did it, but you can be sure that it won't happen again." I said calmly. She let go of me completely then and went to go sit on the edge of her bed. She put her head in her hands.
"I keep seeing her face replay in my mind. I keep wanting to draw more blood from her veins. Why did Aro do this to me?" she sobbed tearless sobs into her hands.
"I think he was trying to be nice. He doesn't understand your humanity." I said, safely away from her by the door. "He meant it to be gift, not a punishment." She stood up without warning and walked back over to me getting in my face a second time.
"I don't want anything from him" she yelled her hand just inches from my face. "And I don't want anything from you either." She whispered. "I just want to get Edward and Alice and leave this place. There is no need for me here."
"He won't let you leave. You're too valuable to him. He won't let the others go either. He knows that they are the only leverage he has against you should you not comply with his request willingly."
"AHHH!" she yelled as she punched the stone wall by my face. I grabbed her then unable to take her tantrums anymore.
"I grow tired of your childlike hissy fits. You're here now and you need to learn how to be one of us. You can't leave. You will never leave. Be happy that you are being considered by Aro. It is an honor. Don't spit at the opportunity, embrace it." She avoided my eyes and pushed me hard enough for me to let her go but not enough to send me flying across the room.
"Get out." She said calmly. "I can't look at your red eyes anymore."
"I'm not going anywhere." I responded just as calmly. I didn't need to be here. I wasn't told to smother her with my presence but I didn't want to leave her. I was starting to disgust myself.
"Please leave." She said again.
"No." I began to say again when I was interrupted by her door slamming up against the wall.
"Edward." She sighed in relief and ran over to him as he held her close. He lifted her up in his arms as she wrapped her legs around his waist. I felt like ripping his arms and legs from their sockets and tossing them into a fiery pit.
"Bella, are you okay?" she nodded into his shoulders and a feeling so foreign to me, that I almost didn't recognize, came over me. I was…jealous. What was so special about Edward? Why him? Why couldn't she be comfortable like that with me?
Edward snarled and looked over her head at me.
"Stay away from her Alec." He growled.
I will not. I said to him in my mind.
"Edward, please, don't." she whispered and he returned his full attention back to her, running his fingers through her hair trying to sooth her, kissing her cheek and her neck. I could throw up just looking at them.
I stalked off passed the two of them and closed the door behind me, but not before I locked eyes with Bella's. Our crimson eyes staring at each other for a split second longer than needed be. I captured all of her features within that 1/100th of a minute. It might as well have been a million years.
Her pouting lips, her big red eyes with her long eye lashes, her heart shaped face and pale skin that shone like a prism when the sunlight from the window hit it her face at an angle. She was beautiful. I would give her that. If I wasn't careful, she would get me into a lot of trouble.
She closed her eyes just as the door shut completely. I ran down the stairs and to my chambers.
I blared the music so that every thought would be drowned out, so that I wouldn't think of her. I couldn't think of her. She wasn't mine to have. Even if she wanted me by some miracle, even then I couldn't have her. She belonged to Aro.
I was going to have to stay away from him, too now. He could not see these thoughts in my mind. He could not see how much I wanted this stranger, this enigma, this beauty to be mine and only mine.